Pearler of a snail

Birmingham's National Sea Life Centre has an Indian volute (Melo melo) on display. And they've had to step up security to make sure that no one runs off with it. Not because it's the only one in the UK but because the species is known to produce pearls. Occasionally. Every now and then. When it feels like it.

As News:lite puts it:

Experts say the chance of the snail actually containing a pearl are low, but the chance of a dumb Brummie thief thinking they could get their hands on a pearl producing machine is high.

I'm not sure that the experts said all of that.

It reminds me of the time that a couple of eejits broke into the Geology Department of the Museum of Victoria (when it was still on Russell Street) and stole what they thought was a genuine gold nugget that had been sitting in the window. Not just any old nugget, by the way, but the "Welcome Stranger".

They smashed the window, grabbed the loot and carried it down La Trobe Street, only abandoning their haul after they dropped it ... and it shattered. Yes, they'd nicked a gold-painted plaster model. After all, the real "Welcome Stranger" weighed ... ooh ... let's see ... 72 freakin' kilos. And that's just what someone would leave lying around in the office. If it still existed. Which it doesn't.

Homework, people. Homework.

To top it all, one of the gold plaster-thieves put his hand flat against the glass when he swung the hammer, so the cops had a lovely big palm print with every finger nicely represented.

Snail-kidnapping seems quite reasonable by comparison.